Production of colored glass objects is an ancient art. Objects such as vases characteristically are all of a single color. Multicolored vases are made, but usually the different colors are in compact masses, such as a colored vase having a transparent handle. Multicolored vases also may be made by swirling one color of glass within another or by adding colored pieces such as medallions to protrude above the surface of the object itself.
Multicolored glass objects such as stained glass windows also have been made, and these are characteristically produced by holding variously colored pieces of glass in the desired relationship to one another by embedding their edges in channels of lead or other malleable metal.
Although it is desirable, there is no medium by which multicolored glass objects having distinct patterns can be made with smooth surfaces and as a continuous glass object having the pattern integral with the rest of the object. This is particularly true of objects in the form of flat panes of glass of ordinary sizes such as those that can be installed as windows.
In this specification and the appended claims, the term color is used in its usual sense as well as in a sense associated with glass. It is defined as either transparent or opaque glass elements of varying colors and includes opaque white glass, which is readily distinguishable from transparent glass.
The term pattern as used herein is defined as a deliberately made, distinct form or shape and includes representations of objects, animals, trees, persons, scenes and the like, as well as geometric shapes. Normally, an arbitrary form caused by swirling or running different colored glasses together is not a pattern in the sense of this invention.